Guild Wars 2

Here’s my build:

http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?fYEQNAoYVlUmiO3ey5E+5Ex2jdqTeypwpG1TBZHLA;T0Ag0Cno4ywlgLLXOukctsYYxhiHFzCA

The traits in trickery offer great group buffs. Additionally, shortbow offers incredible AoE damage with berserker’s gear (which is what I always wear in dungeons), and dual daggers is one of the best single target (as in, boss) damage weapon sets in the game, only a little behind warriors with dual axe or GS. Killing things before they kill you IS utility in its own right. I’ve seen groups of full support characters which have tons of buffs rolling constantly. You know what? Those runs have been AWFUL; painfully slow and often involve wars of attrition. The cleanest runs I’ve had have been 5 people in full berserker’s gear, usually warriors, thieves, and guardians.

My biggest issue with thief, the entire time, has been survivability. I’ve learned to dodge thanks to the inherent squishiness of the class, but I feel there is a large hole in thief design that needs to be addressed.

Stealth is supposed to be our saving grace. We share the lowest base HP with the Guardian and Elemental professions, both of which have immunity abilities and lots of other survival utilities. And our defense is supposed to be stealth. Good. Great. I get it.

Here’s the problem. Stealth is, in it’s current form, and OFFENSIVE tool, not defensive, in most scenarios. Sure, it allows you to avoid some direct target skills. Notice I said “some”; we’ll get back to that later. However, it is entirely useless against AoE’s and skills that do not require targeting, which is most melee attacks. Some of those AoE attacks have such a large area of effect that one dodge does NOT get you out of them. Our only form of long lasting stealth puts an area on the ground that anyone can see, and has a fairly small radius in comparison to most aoe attacks, meaning if we stand in it we will likely die against any competent player. Ok, fine, stealth shouldn’t be an “I win” button and make you immune to everything; I can live with trying to juke people into thinking I’m somewhere else.

Here’s what’s GENUINELY broken with stealth: any channeled or cast attack that is put on us before we enter stealth continues to hit us. If we are forced to use stealth as a survival mechanic, this is 100% unacceptable. On top of that, as if the damage received wasn’t bad enough, projectile attacks CONTINUE TO TRACK US, showing the enemy EXACTLY where we are. Good teams in tPvP abuse this, spamming weak, casted or channeled abilities with little to no cooldown and an easy to see effect to prevent thieves from being able to make proper use of stealth. This MUST be fixed, or thieves need to be bumped up to the next HP tier. There is no debate. Our damage has been nerfed to more or less fair levels (mug is still broken, and should be removed from the game completely), but our survivability has received ZERO attention.

I will still play my thief in PvE because I love it, but in PvP and WvW stealth is not an acceptable form of survival in its current form.

This was actually incredibly well written, and surprisingly fact-based for a post on this forum.

I agree that Dancing Dagger hit too hard. I don’t think anyone is willing to argue that given the potential for 20k dmg for 4 initiative with 2+ people standing near each other. However, the initiative cost MUST be adjusted to compensate.

And I also agree the dev’s missed the mark 100% with the C&D nerf. First, the majority of complaints about the “burst” spec wasn’t even in sPvP, as it’s not viable in tournaments, but rather WvW, which has featured no change. Second, the burst spec has barely been touched, and neither of the two broken aspects about this were addressed. First, Steal should have a cast time; while short, it would prevent precasting C&D and using it to guarantee a hit on someone. It’s one thing to have a movement utility be able to be cast during an attack (like Shadowstep), it’s completely different with steal. Second, Mug hits a little too hard. Maybe a 10-20% nerf is in order here.

Best possible fix? Make the Mug trait do the damage it does now, but put a .5s cast time on steal ONLY with this trait. This way, it still adds more damage, but you have a fair trade as a result.

This solves the burst build issue without crippling some other builds (including my high-stealth dagger build which relied on C&D for a good part of it’s damage and DOESN’T instagib people).

Finally, when you nerf the damage of a melee oriented class that is squishy, you have to compensate. Our base HP is a good place to start; why do we have 2/3 the HP of most classes (and honestly, it’s not fair to Guardians or Ele’s either, but Guardians have lots of powerful utility to survive and ele’s have range), and almost half the base HP of warriors? I can honestly understand a 20% difference. But 90%? Come on. Stealth does not make us immune to damage, and any smart player will use abilities to damage the thief at all times (hell warriors don’t even have to be smart to do this).

ZLE.8293:

Xyrm.5602:

Usually a signet (shadows or assassin) is a better choice for the 3rd slot, for mobility or damage. Especially if you’re using OH dagger or pistol, you don’t NEED blinding powder as you’re probably pushing against the sneak attack cooldown as it is.

Oh yes,you do.32 sec 5-6 sec stealth,that can be used while stunned and also blinds the stunner,i think you do.Or at least any non BS-burst does.I assume you as a fan of those 2 signets that you mentioned are a BS-Burst build.I suppose that anything with lower CD that your Steal-Basilisk Venom-Assassins Signet is useless for your setup and gameplay.

I’m actually not a BS burst build, but a more survival oriented D-D build that whittles away repeatedly with backstab (see signature, but I use valk gear in pvp). I usually DO run with Signet of Shadows though, which allows for faster movement (making it easier to actually land backstabs and be more mobile in general) AND an instant aoe blind which can be used at any time on a 30s cooldown, and is centered on your target with 1200 range meaning it is guaranteed to hit. I never had issues hitting with C&D, and using blinding powder when stunned does NOT break stun, meaning you’re still there eating a 100b to the face or whatever else was already cast on you (and therefore, has no real extra utility over the signet).

Usually a signet (shadows or assassin) is a better choice for the 3rd slot, for mobility or damage. Especially if you’re using OH dagger or pistol, you don’t NEED blinding powder as you’re probably pushing against the sneak attack cooldown as it is.

Genuinely surprised mug wasn’t nerfed, but I don’t use it. I run a more defensive D/D + SB build and it works great for me, and while I use C&D a good bit, it doesn’t really cripple me or my playstyle, and DD was far too OP earlier (in WvW, spot 2-3 non 80’s, dump initiative, and all would be downed).

They are now giving Precision instead of power.

At least they were, according to my character sheet post-patch last night. Didn’t have the foresight to take a screenshot of before/after and I’m at work now.

Keep in mind, all the below are 80’s in full exotic gear.

I made a ranger first, and found it exceedingly boring (and plagued with awful pet mechanics, plus longbow at max range can be avoided simply by walking perpendicular to the range).

Then I made a mesmer. LOVED it. Unique, very bursty (play a GS + S/S shatter build) character with lots of unique utility.

Then I made a GS warrior for dungeons, because both of the above were lacking. It was incredibly strong in PvE, but also incredibly boring and easy. There’s no finesse to the class.

Finally thief. I feel in love with this class by level 5. It just FEELS fluid, and the initiative management is just so much better than pure cooldowns. It also felt INCREDIBLY squishy, but it just made me play better and learn how to counter better. I don’t use the cookie cutter burst build; rather, I rock D/D + SB with a 0/30/20/0/20 build for high stealth uptime and group buffs as well as more survivability than pure glass cannon builds. It is without question my favorite character, and I’m expecting the nerfs shouldn’t hurt me much since I don’t abuse specific overpowered ability combos.

I love how everyone who has never played a thief but fights them think we have some magic button we can spam that just instantly puts us in stealth without having to do anything. Every form of stealth a thief has, has a cost, the most common of which has a moderate initiative cost AND requires us to land a very specific hit with a noticeable animation. If you dodge that, BAM you just prevented stealth, a solid amount of damage, AND the potential for massive damage. It’s all a matter of learning WHAT to dodge. Instead of crying about it, learn how to counter it.

ZombiesTT.3619:

Dual dagger thieves spam heartseeker or death blossom

Only those who were dropped on the head as children. This caused me to stop reading. If you really spent as much time as you claimed on thief, you would realize this remark was valid for maybe the first 3 weeks of the game, max. To be a good D/D thief now, you need to make use of all of your abilities except death blossom.

Jeffrey Vaughn.1793:

The issue is, what sort of failsafe is going to work? If it’s timed, why wouldn’t all the guides just say “Wait 10m and the objective will complete without you doing anything.” That’s not very fun. Was it IN the tree?

Yes. I could see one arm sticking out when I looked closely. The tree RIGHT in the middle.

It says the same thing it always does… “Follow the Pale Tree through the vision of orr”. I’m in an instance right now, just happened a THIRD time.

Update: just ran a circle around the perimeter. NOTHING around. Looked everywhere, there are no enemies… unless they are WAY outside the perimiter of the circle.

UPdate 2: Turns out there was one stuck in the tree. Cluster bombing the tree randomly showed damage, and I was able to kill it and clear it. PLEASE PUT IN SOME KIND OF FAILSAFE FOR THIS. It is rediculous. I don’t even have a knockback, which means it either walked in there, or some friendly npc knocked it into there.

More than two months in, this quest still bugs for me at the same point (when you fight the veteran risen giants, after everything dies the NPCs just split in two groups and the quest never progresses). I’ve tried twice now on this character, the same thing.

Even if they nerf our burst, there’s a lot of ways they can compensate. They probably won’t reduce backstab, as it’s not the problem; the problem is using backstab in conjunction with a lot of other talents and abilities. Being able to precast C&D and steal in the middle is a little overpowered, and mug probably hits too hard.

I would expect IF we get a nerf in damage, we would see a survivability boost and sustained damage.

Stealth isn’t THAT strong. Channeled effects still hit you if they were started before you stealthed (such as ranger rapid fire, or warrior rifle channel or aimed shot), allowing the player to at least know the angle you are at in comparison to them (if not the distance, which can usually be fairly accurately guessed). Honestly, this should not be possible; other games with stealth have always broken channeled/casted abilities if you stealthed in the middle of them.

Given how easy it is to stealth, however, I can see how this would be overpowered.

Klawlyt.6507:

spif.7580:

This and Shadow Refuge should never leave your utility bar if you are playing WvW. It’s that good.

I prefer the much less popular Blinding Powder to SR. It makes a much better oh kitten button, and with the blind and instant cast, helps counter the frequent 100 blades and fellow thieves’ bursts.

Since my build has 20 points in Shadow Arts, I pick up trait VI (Blind when you stealth) for most situations. Between the heal and C&D, I blind a LOT.

spif.7580:

This and Shadow Refuge should never leave your utility bar if you are playing WvW. It’s that good.

Yeah, right now I’m running Shadow Step, Shadow Refuge, and Signet of Shadows (I think, whichever gives 25% movespeed with blind on activate).

Thanks for all the tips, guys! I’ll try a few of these in WvW. I use blink all the time on my mesmer, and it’s just a better form of blink, so I’m not sure why I had so much trouble.

Dee Jay.2460:

Aim your Shadowstep behind enemies for an extra few seconds of confusion.

It also allows you to easily pass some of the mini-games/puzzles ANet put into some of the Dungeons.

Remember the lazer barriers in the Crucible of Eternity? A quick Infiltrator’s Arrow + Shadowstep will allow you to bypass it in a matter of seconds.

I mean you can instantly teleport almost anywhere within 1200 Range. How is that not useful?

I meant more combat oriented uses. I’ve never had an issue getting past any of the puzzles. I’m asking why shoulkittenep it on my bars for PvE or WvW, not puzzles; if I needed it for whatever reason, I could swap it for a second.

I’m not saying it’s not useful, I’m saying I don’t think I know how to use it properly and was hoping for some tips…I’m just trying to improve my own play. Just leveled my thief and I’m having a blast, and I want to do well with it.

I keep hearing amazing things about this ability, but I have a hard time using it effectively. I was hoping for some pointers on how to use it effectively (or what situations it’s best for) in regards to PvE and WvW.

For some context, I’m riding the D/D + SB bandwagon, but my build won’t be the 30/30/0/0/10 build designed to blow one person up every minute (will be more like 0/30/20/0/20).

90% Sure legs are from the Arah dungeon vendor.

This idea isn’t bad, but would cheapen the value of legendaries to everyone who worked hard for theirs without getting help.

Considering how much gold is exchanged in this economy, and mail trades are still popular due to the 15% tax on TP sales, I really wouldn’t worry about it. I saw a Dawn sold in trade chat the other day for a few hundred gold. Really, unless you’re transferring truly suspicious amounts of gold (thousands), I think you’re fine.

As part of the Halloween event, one of the achievements is to complete a certain number of events. I saw a handful of these the first day but got no credit, and only one yesterday (and all of them in Gendarran (sp?) fields, randomly running around). Anyone have a good strategy for completing this?

Yes, please! This is an awesome idea. I’ve already run into this problem after collecting the CoF and arah sets. I had a full CoF set with expensive runes (Divinity), but wanted the look of arah. Ultimately, I had to buy a second set of runes which set me back a LOT for gear stats I already had, when all I wanted was a new look.

Yes, I know, first world GW2 problems…

I did not. As an update, after FINISHING the profession, I did gain my 10 levels. Sorry.

It was my understand cooking gives a % experience gain, and after every 100 levels of craft you should get 2.5 levels. Instead, I just power leveled it to 200 with a crafting booster, and got 3 levels (checked how many trait points I got, to be sure). This is going to RUIN my plan to get 80 with 4 professions from 40….

EasymodeX.4062:

Runes of the Scholar.

This. It is, without question, regardless of build, the most powerful DPS rune any ranged DPS can have. 10% more damage for having 6/6 while above 90% health (which is usually the case on my mesmer) is way more than you can get from ANY other rune set, by a large margin.

GADefence.5634:

If you do this, should we also lock down the assassin’s ability to use the shortbow to teleport around outside of combat?

Or the warrior’s sword leap?

Or any other closing mechanic outside of combat.

No, it’s more around swiftness in specific. The problem isn’t even just how long it takes a player by themselves to get around, it’s how difficult it is to keep a large group together with just swiftness. There is just an extreme discrepancy with how some classes get around compared to others. I know completely removing this gap isn’t possible, but I would like to greatly lessen it.

Even outside of WvW this discrepancy is frustrating. Do you know how much longer it takes a mesmer to world complete compared to a warrior or thief? How much harder it is to run events in straights or cursed shore, especially if you get unlucky and get tagged by a mob? This kind of change wouldn’t really cause balance issues, and would improve quality of life for a few classes significantly… and it would probably be better than re-designing or creating new abilities.

It’s pretty obvious in WvW that some classes are just FAR better at getting around the map then others, and as someone who did 100% world completion on a mesmer it is PAINFULLY obvious. All classes have different levels of swiftness, but even passives across classes that grant increased movement speed are not equal (the only mesmer passive requires clones, which requires you to be in combat… but warriors get faster movement ALL THE TIME?).

We all know that your out of combat movement speed is a good deal faster than it is in combat. My suggestion is to level the playing field; make swiftness ONLY work in combat. As a potential second change, increase the out of combat movement speed even more. Just allow large groups of players to keep up with each other; certain abilities which grant swiftness have caps on the number of players affected, and it’s difficult to keep groups of more than 5 people together in WvW.

It’s no secret that mesmers have the weakest movement kit of any class in terms of swiftness uptime. Additionally, the only passive trait that increases movement speed requires illusions to be out, which we can’t do it in combat.

Fhaeris.9237:

Dude, no offense but you’re terrible. How did you manage to get to R31 and still messing up like that?

This is proof that grinding ranks is NOT a matter of skill, but time. I know a lot of people who just queue hotjoin with a thief and mindless spam, because that’s the easy way to gain rank quickly.

Don’t know why, but it’s getting really frustrating. I get booted by the game and have to log back in. As you can imagine, this adds a certain challenge to dungeons and has already made me lose credit for a few DE’s. Every 30 minutes, ON THE DOT, at 25 and 55 after the hour, I disconnect. This never happened before the patch.

I’m planning on powering my alt from level 40 to level 80 via crafting my last 4 professions, but I have plenty of experience boosters (8). Anyone know with some reasonable certainty how much extra exp I would get? For example, can I expect 12 levels per completed profession instead of 10?

This game is well balanced. For all the stuff I’ve mentioned, I’ve never had a problem against a warrior 1v1 where I lost and didn’t realize what I did wrong. Every time I lost, I forgot to use something that would have been clutch and saved me. More often than not, if I’m about to win the warrior runs away, because they have so many tools to do so, and I have virtually no tools to gap close (blink is an amazing stun break, so it’s usually used to survive, and I never really use a focus outside of sieging in WvW to yank people off buildings/cliffs).

I would however look forward to fighting a warrior skilled in an unpopular playstyle. I hope we may one day meet on the fields of sPvP or WvW! (if I don’t main change to warrior first!)

Rizzy.8293:

I think everyone hates fighting against mesmers, yet they complain about thieves and their stealth.

Honestly, I felt that way too on my ranger. Then I made a mesmer just to try to learn more about the class. Now, it’s my new main because it’s just so much fun (and unique from any other mmo class I’ve played). Honestly, take a mesmer to level 10 (or just do a few hours of sPvP with one). Try out all the weapons. You will IMMEDIATELY know where the real mesmer is at all times, and what their weaknesses are. It’s really not some insurmountable OP class that is impossible to beat (though I wouldn’t say they are completely EASY to counter, there are classes that are much harder, like thieves).

dpcaldae.3068:

there are no dungeons worth complaining about except from Arah – all paths, and to a lesser extent CoF path 3. Everything else is simple. Yes there are some really annoying parts of each, but they’re all easily doable.

My biggest complaint is the lack of waypoints in more than half the dungeons, since this game is built around ressing and running back.

My group farms Arah on a regular basis; we’ve cleared all of them multiple times, but typically stick to path 3 + either 2 or 4, depending on our mood. It’s not bad if you know what you’re doing and bring a DPS group. The mistake I keep seeing made on these forums is the advice to wear some vit and toughness gear. NO. Wear full berserker’s or rampagers (whatever is best for your class/spec), and learn to dodge.

Wyrdthane.6801:

Dear Sir:

It goes more like this,

“Mesmer Casts Explode, and nothing happens, because all his Illusions are Dead.”
“Mesmer gets Flustered and looses his cool, as he watches his HP wash Away”

Nope. My main is a mesmer (and warrior an alt, hence why I’m here). First, most GOOD shatter mesmers pick up a trait in the illusion tree that allows them to have one more shatter … on themselves. This means I don’t need ANY clones out to cast shatter, though it will only be as effective as if one clone was out (and was exactly where I’m standing, which means if I’m not very close it won’t work). Still, that’s a solid 5k smack with my gear during that. And, and the same time, I can use Sword 2 to be immune to damage for 2 seconds while doing another 5k or so to you. After that immunity wears off, I can dodge or do my other shatter which makes me immune to damage for 1s for each clone I have out (plus 1 on me, up to a potential total of 4s). Since I run S/S + GS, I also have the single most bursty phantasm with OH sword (which if it hits you, can hit upwards of 4k with NO debuffs on you) and a block which counters for 5-7k if it crits. Lets also not forget most mesmers have a trait which creates a clone when they dodge, and gain vigor (100% endurance regen for 1s) when they crit (which with greatsword and a typical shatter build is OFTEN).

Basically: seeing a warrior in WvW or sPvP with the berserker debuff is basically my Halloween bag of candy. “This is a bunch of nonsense!” you might say. Well yes, mesmers are very strong burst characters in PvP and have a lot of immunity abilities which, when used correctly (and 90% of mesmers do NOT use them correctly) can let you live through some silly stuff. What mesmers suck at is running away… we have ONE swiftness ability in our entire class, and blink. That’s the extent of our mobility. Breaking all of our illusions and stunning/knocking us down for a solid 5+ seconds is great way to pressure a mesmer into running, at which point they are dead.

On the other hand, the OP is right about maces. They are notoriously effective at squashing illusions. If I see a tanky warrior with a hammer or OH mace, I will generally try to avoid them, not because I don’t think I can win but more because I don’t feel like it’s worth the effort and few minutes of my life. If I see a GS, Rifle, Bow, or Axe, it’s a pretty safe be they are squishy and I will proceed.

@Rockaholic

Warriors are the single highest PvE DPS class in the game. If your guild prefers you to play a guardian, that’s valid if they need support, but warriors are NOT useless. By comparison, rangers and necros ARE, in fact, useless.

Since there haven’t been any official tournaments yet, or even features in-game required for e-sports, how can one be “pro”. Grinding to rank 30+ can be done solo and is not unlike getting a legendary; it takes a LOT of time, but there is no skill requirement, as of yet.

Sabin.4590:

using the trebuchet, then getting attacked by an elementalist, running a confuse build, killing it in 4s without loosing any life and then:

" What are an OP class mesmer is!" which i replied
" Just stop hitting yourself" , quite a fun day.

How did you lose no life with a confuse build? Confusion only ticks if they cast a spell…did you really avoid 5-6 casts in a row, completely?

@Levetty (Seriously, why can’t I copy/paste in here, or double quote?)

I wouldn’t worry about PvE. It’s pretty clear we have very solid burst (shatter builds) and conditions versus players (confusion doesn’t work well on monsters because they rarely use abilities), but are weak in sustained DPS. If we see a nerf to the two former ones, we will almost certainly get a buff to the latter.

Here you go:

http://dulfy.net/2012/07/21/gw2-armor-previews/

Parisalchuk.9230:

@Xyrm

A tip, the plants wont shoot poison if your invisible

(If you catch my drift and have a thief on your team, Ill leave it to the rest to figure out how to utilize it)

It’s hard to keep invisibility up on the group in the middle of say, the champion vine fight. The whole concept of the poison mushrooms needs to be re-evaluated. It’s not a legitimate skill mechanic, it’s a nuisance that, AS YOU JUST POINTED OUT, can be cheesed. That’s not skill, that’s dependency on thieves and mesmers (the latter doesn’t even have GOOD options for invis… a 3s and 4s both on a 90s CD).

I can’t help but feel that someone at Anet just forgot to carry one or two 0’s for their respawn time and then when it was released they just said “meh, kitten it!”.

Shawno.4293:

The best build I could get for my warrior was a AOE healing build with banners using vit power toughness gear. Using two banners. I was loving that build until I decided to test out my guardian.

So wait, let me get this straight…

…you tried out a support build … without any +healing. What?

If you were serious about this, you’d go for a set of clerics gear. Shouts scale very well with +healing.

Yeah, as if our movement wasn’t bad enough, it doesn’t stack with other swiftness because some people exploited early on and kept running through their own wall repeatedly.

I’d run it, except all the armor and weapons are just so UGLY (the weapons are asura racial stuff, but the colors they used for the dungeon are disgusting).

Best way to kill this boss: simply ignore the spark mechanic altogether. We’ve killed her quite a few times now, and it’s the only way to reliably do it in one shot (or not taking 30 minutes).

theeagleeye.7693:

BaconCatTheGreasy.9542:

Also, TA’s flowers need to be nerfed. At least let scepters one shot them kitten

Completely disagree. A lot of people see the flowers as a bad thing, but only the true strategists and veterans know the real utility of the volatile blossoms. :P

There is no strategy to them. I’ve aquired over a thousand TA tokens, and they are a needless hassle. The only people who can clear them reasonably are staff guardians and shortbow thieves.

The only problem I have with TA is the mushrooms that keep respawning. Some classes aren’t very good at killing them (and some can’t at all, due to bugs). Given the respawn rate, the only two classes that can clear them at any reasonable pace are guardians with a staff or thieves with a shortbow. They need to be made less dense and/or have a lower respawn rate.

I was being chased by 3 people from SoS in WvW on Sunday, trying to catch up with the rest of my guild. I realized I couldn’t outrun them (two warriors and a guardian… permaswiftness!) so I turned around to fight. Had my greatsword out, did a 2—>4—>dodge toward them —> F2 shatter (since the fight just started, they were going to spam abilities so it would be more damage). Swapped to Sword/Sword (hit F4 shatter for 1 sec of immunity…love trait XI in illusions) hit 3 —> hit 2 —> hit 5 —> hit 4 --> F1 shatter, 2 were down. A F3 shatter with no clones (did I mention I love this trait?) to interrupt the guardian’s heal (the two warriors HAD to be glass cannon GS, both were wearing mostly CoF gear), followed by a couple 1’s from the S/S finished off the guardian.